The Maya Angelou quote that served as inspiration for the Untold Brewing name.

When I reached the point where opening my own brewery shifted from a far-fetched idea to a legitimate career decision, I was especially excited about one particular aspect of starting a company. This brewery would be my new baby and as its parent I would provide it with arguably the most important attribute that would follow my baby for the rest of its life: its name.

Choosing your company’s name is something every entrepreneur thinks about well before the company even exists. And like naming a child, the name you select will either empower that company or potentially haunt it for the rest of its life. No pressure.

As my business plan started to take shape, I couldn’t wait to give the brewery its name. However, this task turned out to be much harder than I ever anticipated.

Currently there are over 5,000 breweries in the United States. Expand your search worldwide and there are tens of thousands. That means in today’s craft beer climate, selecting a unique and meaningful name that hasn’t already been used verbatim or in some close variation becomes really freaking hard. For months I thought about what I should name the brewery and compiled a long list of potential names that made the phone book look like light reading. I got really close on a couple occasions but each time the name was either already taken or something felt too forced about the name.

And then one day it all came together. I read a simple sentence that perfectly summed up everything I had experienced leading up to that day. Every emotion I had felt during my career that led me to craft beer was found in a simple yet profound quote by Maya Angelou:

“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”

I believe most people have an unfulfilled goal – an untold story - inside them, dying to be revealed. For years now, opening a brewery has been my untold story. I used to have a corporate job that served me well, but the “agony” of my untold story grew every day. As my dream of becoming a brewer grew, I began dedicating all my free time to exploring it. And this eventually led to me landing my dream brewing job. It may sound ridiculous and a bit sensational, but it was one of the happiest days of my life.

I went on to brew for two years, enjoying every second of my new career and having my already lofty expectations exceeded daily. But becoming a brewer wasn’t the finish line. My main goal all along has been to open a brewery. And that brewery needed a name to reflect my untold story and the winding path that brought me to this point.

Now with Kristin and Kyle on board, the story of Untold Brewing continues to be written. Our brewery has come a long way in the past year and we can't wait to soon share some amazingly delicious beers, along with the untold stories behind them.